Once Saved, Always Saved

Once saved, always saved is a human cliche, but it's meaning is center-line Pauline, and it's exactly what the Bible teaches.  Does Christ save us, or do we use Christ's work as part of a multi-faceted plan to save ourselves?  We cannot save ourselves.  We repent in general when we have turned from our old life and gotten new life, becoming a new creature and baptized in The Holy Spirit, when we follow the simple, revealed biblical mandate for salvation.   Except for Christ, Himself, no human being can fully repent of every sin or reach a state of sinless perfection.If they could, they'd have to have The Holy Spirit to help them do it, but The Holy Spirit is not given to the World, but only to Christians, and so, even if sinless perfection could be achieved, it would be achieved by people who were already Christians.  Sanctification is not a cause of salvation.  Instead of OCD, trust 1 Corinthians 15:1-8 and Romans 10:9, 10, and 13.  Then let God work on your flesh, which wants you to believe false and difficult will-worship.  If you spend a lot of energy, don't spend it to keep yourself, but spend it to focus on every word of Romans 6-8 and Hebrews 5-10.  Follow every thought through and know that we are not under the Mosaic Law or any written ordinance for our salvation.  Paul served God and his body served sin at the same time!  I know that it's a bit shocking.  Stop worshiping your ability to "repent" in such a way that you are consciously not aware of any sin that you haven't yet repeated a mantra and felt a negative emotion in your fake cleansing ritual.  Know that God forgave your sins of tomorrow when He was on the cross!  You do believe He died *for your sins*, don't you, and that He was buried, Resurrected and seen afterward by many eye-witnesses, in full accordance with the prophecies and descriptions found in the Bible, don't you?  You have called on the name of the Lord, verbally confessing Master Jesus, haven't you?  Let Him be enough.

Ephesians 5:5 is accurate when it says that nobody who does those things will enter the Kingdom of God.  The flesh won't be a part of Christians any more at that time, because we will be transformed at the Rapture, in the clouds, before entering Heaven.  Ephesians 5:5 doesn't mean, "if you consciously sin, you'll not enter the Kingdom of God", it means, "since the Kingdom of God won't have sin in it, choose not to sin now" ..because it's not your nature...  So, what about 1 Corinthians 15:1-2?  Exegete it with focus!  Accept it.  "It" (the following verses - a single thought through verse 8) is the thing wherein you stand (so long as you have actually believed it and have not believed it in vain, or emptily).  And tie in Romans 10:9-10, that explicitly says that salvation is by verbally confessing Master Jesus and believing in the Resurrection, because (it says) we are saved by verbally confessing Master Jesus and we gain righteousness - not by consciously being free of all sin, which is the *outcome* and not the *cause* of righteousness - but we gain righteousness by believing the Resurrection!  Now, anything that conflicts with *that* is man-made.

It's like Paul said, he is serving God with his mind while his flesh serves sin.  He repented of it, even though his body still does it.  We do repent and we do bear fruit, even though our bodies sin.  Don't be angry with me - I'm sincere, for your sake, with knowledge as best I know it - and don't keep saying the same thing, unless you really believe that merely hearing the words over and over causes new knowledge to spring up in me.  Where's your desire to actually help me more than to fulfill your duty here?

Do you deny that your body, almost continuously, has little instances of lies, pride, lust, fear, murder, envy, and other sins that you cannot remember to "repent of", whatever that means to you, whether it is a complex ritual or whether you've gotten it down to an small action?  How do you repent of things on that tiny scale, anyways?

How do you refute 1 Corinthians 15:1-2 and the phrases "you will be saved" and "to salvation" in Romans 10:9-10 or "Whoever will ... will be saved" in Romans 10:13?

You are using your notion to assume that Paul must have repented after each sin . Show me the verse that says that!  You have a different fundamental application for the word "repent" than I do.  I think repentance is the act of calling on the name of the Lord in belief that He died for our sins, was buried, Resurrected and seen afterward by many witnesses.  You think repent is ... what?  Saying a prayer, feeling and emotion, making a claim in your mind of hatred of the sin?  That's absurd!  You can't and your aren't doing those things totally enough - no one can.  Simply trust Christ to change your desire, your heart and your mind to do right more often and to bear more fruit. Fruit is not the lack of sin, but "love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness...", also known as the fruit of the Spirit, Who we must trust to change us as we pray (normally) and read the Bible and fill our minds with good truths about the things we see and as we do right acts.  What's your reaction to the fact I already mentioned that belief in the Resurrection leads us to righteousness?  Please don't answer me back now for a while, especially if you copy and paste.  I'm a serious man, and I don't like having a conversation with the air.  Now engage or stop it!  If you don't believe these things, then are you on a John MacArthur page just to make trouble, or is there some worth in my help to you?  Love me if you would be in Christ.  Tenderly care, and don't just spew the same thing over again.  I see your message, and I've responded to some of the Scripture you keep posting.  Consider the fearful Hebrews 10 verses.  Only take it to mean what each phrase says.  Willful sinning certainly does not have any more (any different) sacrifice than Jesus' sacrifice - that doesn't say that willful sinning can no longer be forgiven by Jesus' sacrifice, and we are totally forgiven when we become Christians by confessing and believing, according to the Scriptures, specified in the gospel that Paul was told and then he preached, and which I've told you enough already.  Look at verse 29 - the punishment of God against all sinners, including Christians, is not that we lose our salvation!  Verse 29 doesn't say anything about salvation, nor this whole passage - it's to Christians*!  Consider Romans 11:22 by looking at the next verse and seeing that those who fall are those who *do not believe*, not those who keep from going to church or even ax-murderers, but those who don't believe the tenets of the gospel!  They are cut off, because they don't believe it.  Matthew 25:35 and onward proves the point: He rewarded those who were His based on a different standard than He used to punish those who are not His.  We are not His by doing good, we are His by belief and confession, relying on Him to save us.  God counted Abraham's belief *as though it was good behavior, good works and righteousness (which all mean the same thing).  Matthew 6:14 is not about salvific forgiveness, but the word "forgive" in that context means "stop applying punishment" in the here and now.  "Saved" takes on that kind of meaning in several places, too - it's not talking about ultimate salvation (which, properly speaking, is "justification"), it's talking about saving from trouble or saving from punishment in many places.  You really have been subject to a fear-based control device.  The Bible really does say that we are to trust Jesus in His performance of His good, great work of dying, and we who have believed (trusted) Him - HIM - to do that (all work for our salvation) - have new life in His Spirit through the Resurrection, because the same Spirit who raised Him from the dead teaches us - down in our bones and not only in our minds, through experience as well as by knowing the Bible, which you could use more of) to be righteous, through merely believing the fact of the Resurrection of Christ (Romans 10:9b-10:10a).

Consider John 15:2 by looking at the next verse - you bear fruit, because Christ - HE - has made you clean.  You didn't do it with a ritual, but your trust in Him will end up with you bearing fruit, and, because of that, He's going to prune you to make you bear even more!  Taking away your sin makes you bear more fruit; He takes away the sin of those who are already His through belief (and confession as I've told you more than once now that the Bible simply, straightforwardly and bindingly says).  His blood is all that's required, and you'll find, once you accept that, that you don't have nearly the hangups about sin that you thought you should, and it'll be much easier.  That conclusion is the reason I've tried to teach you this.  It's almost a rejection of actual salvation doctrine to think you have to keep it yourself (now, doesn't that seem to deny that Christ can do it for you, but don't worry - trust Him; you can, you know..).

Concerning 1 John 1:9, if we don't admit that we have sin, then we are liars, which is sinful.  Therefore, we do have sin!  If you said you stopped all sin, which is what your definition of repentance is, then you are lying.  You cannot keep from sinning, and His seed in us makes us cognizant of it, and that knowledge is the confession.  We tell the truth about sinning, which is the opposite of the end result of your method that leaves "repentance" undefined.  Repentance is turning toward Christ, which we do upon the moment of salvation.  The Holy Spirit doesn't make us a new creation - we don't have a new birth - and then go back to being the old creation after we sin, until we say or think or feel something about the sin, or even until we stop it, and then become a new creature again and have a new birth again, over and over!  It's untenable, and it doesn't work - nothing in the Bible draws any conclusion like that, but certain preachers have passed on the idea to many Christians; it's a doctrine of devils that obviously is the same old works religion, because, instead of actually trusting Christ and the work He did to cause salvation, the person starts with Christ and His work and then actively works to "maintain" it his whole lifetime!  That denies Christ's ability, through His death, to actually be the motive power that saves ...all who believe.  The belief is the repentance (along with the confession).  Disbelief is falling away.  Do you believe that Christ's work - itself - is powerful to save all who call on His name?  Only look at Romans 10:13.  It's a simple, direct statement of fact.  Nothing else in the Bible can change it.  It has no provision for any exceptions or little changes, that "whoever calls on the name of the Master shall be saved".  Look at Mark 16:16, which some have tried to use to include water baptism as another necessity for salvation (but we are automatically baptized in The Holy Spirit when we believe and confess and are changed into a new creature).  It says that unbelief causes damnation.  You won't find a place that says unbelief plus a lack of your nebulous definition of "repentance" (although we have repented when we believe and confess and are changed in that moment forevermore into a new creature) causes damnation.. just unbelief.  Paul told us what those beliefs are, which were also told to him, in 1 Corinthians 15:1-8.  What do you believe?

There's nothing special about water baptism, and all Christians are baptized in The Holy Spirit at the time of salvation (justification), when we believe and confess Him.  See that rather clearly in Acts 1:5 and 11:16.  See the first part of the next verse, too, and you'll see how the baptism and belief in Christ go hand in hand.

Since all Christians are baptized, your artificial division doesn't hold up.  You'll want to check the place where you thought Paul warned the baptized Christians who break the commandments willfully and persist in impurity that they shall not enter the Kingdom.  Tell me that verse if you will.  Does it talk about belief?  These fear verses about losing your salvation are really admonitions to not sin because it's NOT OUR NATURE; Galatians 5:15 shows the outcome of a Christian doing evil ("willfully" is assumed).  We hurt each other when we bite and devour each other, and we have to watch out that we're not consumed by one another.

Look at Ephesians 5:5, but connect it with verse 6, also. And then verse 7.  Evil people don't have a place in the Kingdom (5); that's the unbelievers (6); don't be like them (7).  See it?  It doesn't say Christians won't have inheritance in the Kingdom, but that the children of disobedience won't. They are children of disobedience, because they have sinned the one sin that won't be forgiven - to disregard the witness of The Holy Spirit; they are unbelievers and, therefore, not Christians.  So don't DO what THEY DO, because you're different than people who won't inherit the Kingdom of God.  You HAVE believed on Him.  But, if you literally don't believe He's enough to save you from sin (because, why? because you have this word and mindset about "willfully", which doesn't matter at all!  Your unconscious sin is enough to damn you as it was enough to damn the ancient Israelites, because that's the nature of The Law; you are watering it down by making exceptions through your concept of willfulness, which is nowhere to be found in the Bible, except in a single phrase taken to apply to all of salvation doctrine.  Hebrews 10 is talking about belief!  The sin that makes us not be saved is unbelief (that's why we should go to church, to strengthen our belief, especially as we see the day approaching). We have to hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering.  Giving up the confession of our hope is unbelief.  See verses 22-27.  It's about increasing your assurance of faith (which your method heavily attacks to decrease it) so you don't lose faith - belief, aka 1 Corinthians 15:1-8.

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We have to believe the gospel like 1 Corinthians 15:2 says (see verses 1-8) AND verbally confess Master Jesus, calling on the name of the Lord (Romans 10:9, 10, 13) to be saved.  Sanctification after that will make us be dominated by the flesh less and less over time as we reach out to our Master and rely on The Holy Spirit to teach us about our Master Jesus Christ as we read about Him in the Bible and pray, even pray to the Father, asking Him to reveal His Son to us, to whom He sent Him in the first place, and our lovingly gracious Father in Heaven will hear our prayer and reveal Master Jesus.  If you're always concerned with your sin more than growing in knowledge about Christ our Master, then you'll be stymied.  All those verses about evil not entering the Kingdom of God are true - it's just that we have to remember that He will transform us to be like He is when we see Him at the Rapture (before entering the Kingdom of God), and all our flesh will be excised from us then.  Stand against all your sin, but don't - please don't - make a fetish of it, and certainly don't - DON'T - make it a part of salvation doctrine, because it's really part of sanctification doctrine.  See?  Look at your fear verses more closely and ask - ..ask - God to make you see it.  It's all there - Paul was sinning with his flesh and following God with his mind at the same time ("Oh wretched man").  And one day, God delivered him from his flesh (when he died; he'll get a transformed body at the Rapture, too; so whether we are alive at the time in a fleshly body or have already died, we will get a new body then, but the old, fleshly body falls off us when we die).  Don't be afraid of your sin (fear is sin).  You can't get away from it.  Trust Him instead.

It is true that the Christian has the seed of God and His Spirit, Who strives against the flesh.  He seals us, even though we willfully disobey Him.

Another evidence that we don't lose our salvation through willful sin is Paul's admonition to those who were taught Christianity at the very beginning that they should not conclude that grace affords a license to sin.  And what was Paul's reasoning?  Not that we would lose salvation, but that we're not of the nature of sin, so why should we accrue the bondage of it since we have power over that task-master?!